Insurance comparison portal Quashed sees 300% increase in signups in first quarter of the year as thousands seek out insurance cost savings

The CEO behind insurance comparison tool Quashed says there’s been a fivefold increase in the platform's activity compared to a year ago, driven by growing demand for insurance savings amid rising premiums.

Justin Lim launched Quashed in 2020 after seeing a gap in the market for a platform that could scan the market for the best insurance deals while also showing a person’s different insurance policies all in one place.

On Quashed’s platform, which works via a browser instead of an app, consumers can upload their insurance policy documents to access detailed information about their plans, costs, and renewal dates on one page.

The platform has a comparison tool called Market Scan and the feature uses machine learning and AI to analyse and compare insurance policies, providing people with around five different policies as other options.

“We think that that gives people a good sense of the market and I think over time the desire is to add on more insurers and give more visibility and more transparency across the market,” Lim says.

Sign ups to the platform are up 300% in the first quarter of 2024 and Lim says the portal is getting around 3,000 signups per month with that number steadily increasing.

Driving the busy uptake in Quashed is a combination of factors, Lim says, pointing to the impacts inflation and wild weather have had on insurance premiums in the last year alone, which in turn have driven up the costs of premiums.

“Price is definitely a big factor because we haven't seen increases by that much that quickly,” he tells interest.co.nz.

Quashed’s 2024 first quarter report shows comprehensive and third party car insurance premiums are up 40% from the first quarter of 2023, while house and contents insurance premiums have risen 25%.

In the first quarter of 2024, the average comprehensive car insurance premium rose to $1,309 compared to $935 in the first quarter of 2023, while the average third-party car insurance premium increased to $500 from $357 during the same period.

Quashed reported house and contents insurance also saw a significant lift in the last year, although not as much as car insurance had.

House insurance premiums saw a significant 25% increase in the first quarter (Q1) 2024 compared to Q1 2023, with the average premium quoted at $2,794, up from $2,243. 

Similarly, contents insurance premiums rose by 24% over the same period, with the average premium quoted at $851 in Q1 2024, up from $688 in the previous year.

Lim says while price comparison across policies is important for consumers to note, they should also be looking closely at which insurance cover offers the best benefits.

“We really want them to actually look through price as well and actually look into the policies to understand how they're covered across various benefits and the limits on these benefits,” he says.

Changes

Lim says when Quashed has gone out and asked consumers on the street to name general insurers, most people can only name three or at most, four.

“When we actually look at brands that consumers can get insurance from a market, it's actually over 20,” he says.

“We do feel like that is really one of the problems that we're trying to solve is giving people more visibility and understanding of the different brands and markets.”

Quashed has found that in the last year, the frequency of insurance pricing adjustments has picked up – which Lim says is in response to recent weather events and the changing climate – which means consumers should be comparing their insurance policies more regularly. 

“...Insurers are trying to pick and choose as well in terms of areas that they want to cover or how much they want to cover in certain areas. So they are kind of repricing their book,” Lim says.

‘ And so for a consumer, it really does pay to shop around to compare because it comes down to timing when they're actually searching and how quickly the insurers move to reprice or adjust the pricing.”

Quashed has no plans to delve into other financial products and the focus is strictly on insurance as the company grows.

“We think that that's a massive problem to crack and we don't really want to go down the paths of some of the other platforms we've seen where they dabble across many different financial services products. And the reason for that, we believe that actually insurance is pretty hard. It can get quite complex,” Lim says.

The insurance law reforms that Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs Andrew Bayly announced earlier this month will also be good for the insurance industry, he says, as Lim believes the reforms will give consumers more clarity and confidence when engaging with insurers.

“I think the industry has actually upped their game, it has changed a lot. I think insurers are trying to do their part to bring clarity in terms of policy wording changes, simplifying it. Even when I look at websites these days, it is encouraging to see that insurers are making a lot more effort in this space,” he says.

“In terms of the law reform, that's only driving it in the right direction, giving consumers their confidence. And ultimately, I think that's a great thing for the industry overall because consumers are going to have far more confidence in terms of shopping and purchasing policies and insurers are obviously going to see an uptake in terms of consumers getting the right policies for them. And I think overall it's going to enable actually more innovation that will come out of these changes.”